Creating a Research Plan with Sort Your Story

Working through genealogical research often requires us to stop and examine what we have, where it came from, and where we need to go from here. Sometimes the information creates a brick wall that we cannot seem to get around or over. At these times it is important to go step by step through our research and create a new plan. Sort Your Story can help you create a research plan for either an individual or a family.

What should be in a research plan?

A summary of your research problem.

The information you know and where it was obtained.

A list of the information you would like to know.

A list of where you might obtain that information.

Individual

Open the Sort Your Story Profiler and then the file for the individual for which you are having issues.

Add a category called Misc. Documents. Title this “Research Plan.”

Go to the notes section and create a research plan based on the information you have gathered for this individual and the information you wish to find. Save the file.

Family

Open the Sort Your Story Profiler and create a new file. Rather than putting in an individual, just enter a surname and then in the first name field, enter the names of both parents of this family.

Add a category called Misc. Documents. Title this “Research Plan.”

Go to the notes section and create a research plan based on the information you have gathered for this family and the information you wish to find. Save the file. To create a plan based on the family you will have to examine all the profiles you created for the individuals within that family. Or you can add the documents relating to that family in this profile.

Use Sort Your Story to create a research plan for you family. Let us know how it worked for you in the comment section.